Bowyer makes up ground in Chase

Keselowski's fuel mishap shaves lead to 7 points

Published 12:12 am, Sunday, October 14, 2012

CONCORD, N.C. — Clint Bowyer picked up his first win in the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship Saturday night, winning a fuel mileage race that ended in disaster for points leader Brad Keselowski.

Keselowski dominated Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway but ran out of gas with 58 laps remaining to blow his chance at the victory. He fell a lap down and finished 11th, and had his lead in the standings sliced in half over five-time champion Jimmie Johnson.

Keselowski, who has a seven-point lead over Johnson at the halfway point of the 10-race Chase, immediately gave his Penske Racing team a pep talk over the radio.

"Win some lose some guys, it's all good," he told them.

Keselowski, who also ran out of gas Friday night in the Nationwide Series race because of a fueling error, then asked his crew if he led the most laps Saturday night. Indeed — he led 139 of the 334 — but had little to show for his effort.

"It's blackjack, you're not going to win every hand," he said. "When you got a bad deal you have to try not to have too many chips on the table."

But Keselowski was able to see a silver lining in still finishing 11th.

"It was the worst-case scenario," he said. "We minimized the damage as best we could."

Denny Hamlin finished second and is third in the Chase, 15 points back, and Johnson finished third. Neither felt all that bad for Keselowski.

"Live by the sword, die by the sword," Hamlin said.

"I don't know how much it hurt him at the end of the day," Johnson said. "I've been doing this long enough, too, when you see something happen, in your mind you're like there's an opportunity and before you know it, it happens to you."

The Australian stormed to pole on the last lap of qualifying, finishing 0.074 seconds ahead of Vettel. Hamilton was third followed by championship leader Fernando Alonso of Ferrari.

Nationwide: Joey Logano raced to his eighth series victory of the year late Friday, passing Brad Keselowski with eight laps to go after taking on two tires and a splash of gas. Logano led 62 laps en route to his 17th career victory and first at Charlotte Motor Speedway.